LITMIR.BIZ

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not trying to be comforting,” Flint snapped back. “I’m trying to keep you alive.”

      Survival. He was right about that. She patted her pockets. She’d forgotten to bring her cell phone. “How long before we have that help you promised?”

      “I don’t know. We’re pretty far out in the country.”

      “Then hand me your phone,” Maggie said. “I need to make a call and I left mine inside.” If it had been anyone but Flint, she would have added please.

      She saw him hesitate.

      “Okay, but keep it short. This is for official use only.”

      “Would you rather I made a run for the house to get my own?”

      “No. Here.”

      Grabbing the phone before he changed his mind, she had to think hard to remember the number that was programmed into her own cell phone.

      A tentative “Hello” was all the greeting she allowed before blurting, “Mom?”

      “Maggie? I almost didn’t answer. This isn’t your number.”

      “No. I’m using a borrowed phone.”

      “What happened to yours?

      “Never mind that. Please, just listen. I need you to pick up Mark from school and keep him at your place until you hear from me. I’ll explain everything later.”

      “But—”

      “Please, Mom? This is really important.”

      “Okay, honey. But I’ll expect all the details when you come get him. And plan to stay for supper. Bye!”

      Sure, assuming I’m able to get rid of my unwelcome visitor by then. Maggie’s fondest hope was that the shooter was attempting to scare the new game warden just on general principle. Given that this particular warden was Flint Crawford, she owed their anonymous assailant a debt of gratitude for trying.

      Too bad it hadn’t worked.

      * * *

      Police and sheriff’s units arrived just ahead of an ambulance. Dressed for the heavier rain that was predicted, Sheriff Harlan Allgood leaned against the fender of the silver-gray Game and Fish truck and shook his head at Flint. “Sorry about this, son. Want me to help you over onto the porch where the medics are working on Maggie?”

      “I won’t be welcome. I can hop in the ambulance if this drizzle gets much worse.”

      “Suit yourself.” He chuckled. “I didn’t dream you’d run into trouble so soon. Who’d you manage to rile in a day and a half?”

      “Beats me.” Flint pulled the leg of his pants up to his knee. “Everybody’s been pretty friendly so far.” He grimaced. “Except for Maggie and her dog.”

      “Wolfie’s always been fine around me,” Harlan said. “What’d you do to set him off?”

      “He was probably reacting to my knocking her down to keep her from getting shot.”

      “I reckon she gave you what for.”

      “Oh, yeah. She actually thought I was going to shoot her dog.” Flint peered into the woods. “Any of your people come up with the real shooter yet?”

      “Nope, and I don’t expect ’em to. The ol’ boys around these parts are good at disappearin’.”

      “Is this the first trouble Maggie’s had?”

      “Why don’t you ask her?”

      “Yeah, well, she and I aren’t exactly on the best of terms.”

      “And that surprises you?” Harlan guffawed. “Folks around here still remember when you turned tail and skedaddled.”

      Flint refused to let the old-timer goad him. The details of the past were nobody’s business but his and Maggie’s. And speaking of the past, if he hadn’t heard that both her brothers had left to establish successful careers in neighboring states, he might have blamed one of them.

      “So, what are you going to do?” Flint asked.

      “’Bout what?”

      “Finding the shooter, to start with. And then protecting Maggie, just in case she’s a target, too.”

      “Don’t know what any of us can do,” Harlan replied with a drawl. “I suppose I can have a deputy cruise by a time or two.”

      “Well, somebody’d better keep a lookout. We could have been killed.”

      Chuckling, the portly older man stepped away to give the medics room to check Flint’s dog bite. “I doubt that. There ain’t many hunters round here who’d miss unless they meant to. You ask me, those shots were a warning.”

      Flint grimaced as a paramedic disinfected his shin and slapped a small bandage on it. Harlan was right. Country boys grew up learning to hit what they were aiming at. Whoever was behind this attack had missed on purpose. If Maggie hadn’t been standing next to him at the time of the shooting, she would have been his chief suspect.

      As if his thoughts had drawn her, she spoke from behind them. “Do you need to see proof of Wolfie’s vaccinations, Sheriff?”

      Harlan shook his head. “Not unless Flint here wants to check ’em.”

      “I trust you,” Flint said. “I’m just surprised you let that dog wander loose where he can bite people.”

      Maggie huffed. “I don’t suppose you’d believe he’s hardly ever growled at anybody else in the four years since I rescued him.”

      “Honestly?”

      “Scout’s honor,” she replied. “He usually barks to tell me someone’s here, but that’s about all.”

      Flint swallowed hard. Maybe he should have stayed in Serenity almost six years ago, for Maggie’s sake, but when she’d refused to even consider eloping he’d decided she didn’t truly love him. In retrospect, he’d wondered if she’d simply been defying her parents by dating him in the first place.

      As the years had passed, he’d been forced to admit that their teenage romance had been doomed. Perhaps they’d been overly attracted to each other because the relationship was forbidden by both their feuding families. It was certainly a possibility.

      And now? Flint studied her closed expression. He and Maggie were very different people. Besides, plenty of gossip had made its way to him since his recent return, and her phone call to her mom had confirmed it. Maggie was a single mother. Clearly, she had moved on and he’d better do the same. Too bad he’d been assigned to renew their acquaintance.

      What puzzled Flint was how Captain Lang had learned about their ill-fated romance. Stories about it could have come up when the department had been researching Elwood Witherspoon and his kin, he supposed. There was no way to discuss Witherspoon and his relatives without mentioning their long-standing feud with the Crawfords. And the way Flint had chosen distance as a means of defusing the mounting tension would certainly have come up.

      Maggie’s deep-seated anger surprised him, though, particularly since he had yet to broach the subject of her uncle’s whereabouts. Hadn’t she read any of his letters? Didn’t she understand he’d acted in the best interests of them both? Even if she disagreed with his choices, surely she could see things from his perspective.

      Flint pushed those thoughts aside. Until the police figured out who had taken a potshot at them, they’d both have to be on guard. He had combat training. Maggie did not. Therefore, since the sheriff wouldn’t take special precautions to protect her, he would have to look into the cause and come up with some answers. Whether she liked it or not. And stay alive in the process.

      And speaking of things she was not going to like, he figured he might as well get it over with so he said, “By the

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